The Cartwright sisters were anxious to use the evening for a visit to certain other friends; shortly after six o’clock they. took their departure.  While Emily and Mrs. Hood were seeing them away at the door, Hood went upstairs to his laboratory.

‘Emily, come here,’ Mrs. Hood said, with anxious earnestness, leading the way back into the sitting-room.  And, when the door was closed—­

’My dear, what is the matter with him?  Don’t you notice his strangeness?’

‘Yes, mother, I do.’

’Can he have—­It’s a thing he never does!  You know what I mean?  That Cheeseman has been taking him to a public-house; I am sure of it.’

Emily had had no such thought.  To her a squalid horror clung about the suggestion.  To picture her father in such circumstances was to realise a fresh fall into degradation, no doubt the inevitable consequence of that she already knew of.  There was a painful stricture at her heart; a cry of despair all but found utterance.

Her father’s voice was calling from the stair-head—­’Emily!’ She darted to the door in momentary terror and replied.

‘Will you come up?’ Hood said; ‘I want you.’

She ascended to the garret.  Hood was standing with his back to the little window, so that his face was shadowed.  Emily moved to the table, and, with her hands resting upon it, her eyes bent, stood waiting.

‘Emily,’ he began, still with a remnant of artificial pleasantry, though his voice was not entirely under control, ’I want to explain that money-matter to you.  It doesn’t look well; I am a good deal ashamed of myself; if I was a boy I should deserve a whipping for telling a fib, shouldn’t I?’

It was impossible to make reply to such words.

‘The truth is this,’ he went on more nervously; ’we’ve been in a little difficulty, your mother and I, that we didn’t see any good in troubling you about.  In fact, there’s a raising of rent, and one or two other little things.  When I was in Hebsworth yesterday I had an opportunity of borrowing ten pounds, and I thought it better to do so.  Then I met Cheeseman, and it was his mention of the debt put into my head the stupid thought of trying to spare your mother anxiety.  Of course, such tricks never succeed; I might have known it.  But there, that’s the truth of the matter, and I’m easier now—­now I’ve told it.’

Her heart bled for him, so dreadful to her ears was the choking of his voice upon the last words.  At the same time she was hot with anguish of shame.  He stood before her a wretched culprit, hiding his guilt with lie upon lie; he, her father, whom she had reverenced so, had compassionated so, whom she loved despairingly.  She could not raise her head; she could not speak.  She longed to spring to him and hold him in her arms, but other thoughts paralysed the impulse.  Had there lain nothing in the background, had his falsehood, his weakness, been all, she could have comforted and strengthened him with pure pity and love.  But the consciousness of what was before her killed her power to stead him in his misery.  She could not speak out her very thought, and to palter with solemn words was impossible.  Hypocrisy from her to him at this moment—­hypocrisy, however coloured with sincere feeling, would have sunk her in her own eyes beyond redemption.